The Florida installations are not the first to have ASDB monitoring and billing.
Vector Aviation Systems has over 200 installations and a number in California that have been operating for a few years now.
So, it’s not a new ‘service’ , it’s just been made very public and pilots are now being made aware of this .
And why would the airport allow the installation of competing fuel farms?
This is not the first time the public funded a system (via taxes ) developed for and by the government and its contractors then got charged BILLIONS to use tech they already paid for! What tech do I speak of why sat. Communications and services. The technology to use an orbiting repeater and bounce telephone calls then t.v. pictures off of them to phones and radios world wide was developed by the government of the united states first for DOD use , then companies used this new knowlege to build television satellites and evolveinto DtV, not only did they use publicly funded and developed methods to build the satellites, how did they get to orbit?? Why on top of a rocket derived from DOD missile technology from a government owned facility full of government equipment staffed by persons employed by the government. So why do I now have to pay a monthly bill to watch my T.V. full of advertising an hour t.v. show is about 35 to 40 % commercials! So now I must buy a satellite t.v. service or pay for cable (acquires programming from same satellite) and endure high frequency advertisements inserted into the shows i try to watch, trying to get me to spend money on certain products for use of a whole lot of technology my parents and myself paid for through taxes we paid to build this wonderful sales pitch device ?? So no I am not surprized that ADS-B is going to be used for profit by some one , just the way things developed by our tax dollars are used for anything but our benefit! History repeats its self yet again…
BTW, Vector Airport Systems has been doing business since 2011, 13 years now, and few of us knew anything about it,
see; https://www.vector-us.com/planepass
" Generating Hundreds of Millions in Aircraft Fee Revenue…"
OK, let’s look at enhancing some comparable systems, and try to predict the reaction of the population involved:
- Toll-road transponders are enhanced to be read from satellites. Effectively, that makes all roads, potential toll-roads. Forget whether tolls are actually charged, the passengers of the car are now under potential surveillance.
- The current situation with multiple cellphone companies, their thousands of towers and bazillion plans and features, is not sustainable when we have sat-phone technology we could build out. It sounds like an improvement until you realize that would essentially place every phone-carrying person under surveillance. We’re almost there with the current system.
Under either of those scenarios, having a single piece of information (license plate, name, tail number, phone number, current location) would allow anyone to know who and where that person is. This is not dystopian science fiction. How fast do you think the general population would revolt? Or do you think that the vast majority of Americans are so stupid that they would agree to it in order to get instant fast-food coupons nearby?
The camel’s nose is already under the tent, and it’s getting much more difficult to write dystopian science fiction.
We’re getting there already.
- State and federal government use taxes on gasoline and diesel to pay for highway maintenance.
- Local drivers buy gas locally and pay for local highway maintenance.
- Long-distance drivers buying fuel away from their home state pay for that state’s maintenance on the highways they use.
That was a reasonable and generally accepted way of paying for road maintenance.
Enter, the electric car.
They don’t buy fuel (directly), so they don’t pay highway taxes.
As electric cars become more and more popular, highway fuel tax revenue has started dropping. States are facing budget shortfalls (exacerbated by more fuel-efficient cars overall).
The solution? A per-mile highway tax.
Bu most politicians fear imposing such a tax just because it’s a new tax. And unlike fuel taxes that are baked into the price-per-gallon, a mileage tax would be highly visible, likely appearing as a bill in the mail or annual registration fee.
But what’s not really being discussed is how those miles would be counted. A simple number is not sufficient - states would want to charge out-of-state drivers (just like they currently do when long-distance drivers buy fuel far from home). This means tracking where every registered vehicle has been.
An additional tax and Big Brother surveillance? That’s a tough sell for even the best politician.
Why would an airport ever disallow landing approval?
The FBO or airport authority is collecting the fee. The tower doesn’t care about collections. I’m assuming a tower in your scenario. Non towered would mean they can’t deny you anything.
If the plane/pilot owes money, landing at the same airport is what they would hope for. Now you are on the ground and you get booted and can’t leave. No safety issue and they have possession of your airplane.
Not just Americans, but most people around the world. This is, after all, how social media works (except without the coupons). Give people something for “free” and they’ll willingly give away a lot of information.
Airports receiving FAA funding cannot prohibit self-fueling ( a private club would be considered the same as an individual) so long as it met a single standard for safety. However they could impose a flowage fee per gallon the same as if a commercial operator was pumping it.
I landed at an airport where there was nothing in any publication on the airport that there were landing fees - not even in the FEES section on ForeFlight. (Since changed). I ignore the bill they sent as they don’t have the right to charge landing fees without notification. I also red-exed that airport to never use it again. Nor will I use any airport with landing fees. We already pay a flow fee with fuel so these airports are double dipping. Europe has been charging all kinds of fees since nearly the beginning. Airway, ILS, center, etc. hundreds of dollars in fees PLUS higher taxes on fuel and yes high landing fees. To land on a grass strip in England used to be a pound sterling per landing. That was 40 years ago. I’m sure it’s up to £25 now PER LANDING.
We need to sue cities who charge landing fees AND charge fuel flowage fees. That would be like paying a fee to drive into a gas station and then pay taxes on the fuel you buy.
Respectfully Russ, no. Safety is a consideration, as is cost for most of us. For me, it’s privacy. In my truck, I can choose to take a route that does not require a toll-road transponder. In my plane, there are huge swaths of airspace that I cannot traverse (much less land) without ADS-B/out. And those swaths are growing.
NO on ADS-B commercialization. ADS-B has greatly enhanced aviation safety and efficiency by providing accurate, real-time data on aircraft. It improves coverage in areas where radar doesn’t reach and helps manage air traffic more effectively. While exact numbers on accident prevention are hard to pinpoint, ADS-B clearly boosts safety, especially when combined with outside-the-cockpit scans. However, using ADS-B for non-safety purposes, such as billing or surveillance, is inappropriate. Aircraft owners paid for “safety” equipment for “safety” purposes, and diverting it for other uses could weaken its primary purpose and reduce its effectiveness. Keep ADS-B focused on enhancing safety and efficiency, not on commercial applications.
This is good as far back as it goes. My employer’s Magnavox Research Lab participated in the first GPS simulation (1970s) test using small transmitters on the desert floor. I was visiting the lab when the results came in showing that the accuracy was twice as good as calculated. During the whoop la several of us private pilots realized that it could be used for a real 3D collision avoidance system, not a 2D bandaid like TCAS. Everything was classified so nothing happened until KAL007 was shot down, Reagan released the basic signal to the world, and the FAA finally accepted GPS (RTCA Task Force 1). A wise FAA management decided that the Korean War era technology 1090-ES version of ADS-B might not work and asked Mitre to take a clean sheet of paper and develop UAT. After four years, the 1090-ES standards group at RTCA was still screaming at each other so they authorized a UAT group. Within a year, UAT’s TSO was published (an FAA record) and 1090-ES took another year. At the Oct 2000 UPS/FedEx/Airborne-sponsored OpEval in Louisville, UAT was perfect; 1090-ES still had problems. Finally, who in their right mind would authorize two data links that don’t talk to each other and then require only the transmitter? (Unless they didn’t want the pilots to separate themselves?)
Privacy is important, scum are ‘protesting’ outside of people’s homes.
BTW, Canada already has user fees for ATC, its system is independent of the government safety regulator.
(Governance of Nav Canada is effectively by a committee of user groups. Seems to work, after some difficulty early on, key is continued cooperation among the user groups. Beware term ‘privatization’. is misleading for the Canadian system.)
With airports given to local committees of professional engineers, accountants, and politicians etc. (Many airports were already owned by cities and private entities, such as Kelowna BC IIRC.)
Benefit is much less fussing about improvements to the system, as utility connects to revenue.
Would car owners stand for people being able to stalk them in real time by copying their license plate number?